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Facies patterns of a tropical heterozoan carbonate platform under eutrophic conditions: the Banc d’Arguin, Mauritania

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Abstract

High-nutrient tropical carbonate systems are known to produce sediments that, in terms of skeletal composition, are reminiscent of their extra-tropical counterparts. Such carbonate systems and associated carbonate grain assemblages in the tropics are rare in the present-day world. Nonetheless, it is crucial to gain a better understanding of those ecosystems, including their drivers and players because such settings potentially represent models for ancient depositional systems as well as for predicted future environmental conditions. One of the modern occurrences of eutrophic tropical carbonate systems is the northern Mauritanian Shelf. The marine environment is characterized by an eastern boundary upwelling system that pushes cool and nutrient-rich intermediate waters onto a wide epicontinental platform (Golfe d’Arguin) where the waters warm up to tropical temperatures. The resulting facies is mixed carbonate–siliciclastic with a dominant foramol association grading into bimol and barnamol grain assemblages in the shallowest areas forming the Banc d’Arguin. Besides this cool water-related heterozoan association, the carbonate sediment is characterized by tropical molluskan species, while chlorozoan biota (e.g., corals and algal symbiont-bearing foraminifers) are entirely absent. We here present a first comprehensive facies analysis of this model example of eutrophic tropical carbonates. Furthermore, we reconstruct the loci of carbonate production and provide a conclusive depositional model of the Banc d’Arguin that received little attention to date due to its poorly accessible nature.

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Acknowledgments

Participants and crew of the Maria S. Merian Cruise MSM-16 leg 3 are acknowledged for providing support. We are grateful to the Mauritanian authorities for their permission to carry out research in their territorial waters. Many thanks are due to Abdoul Dia from the Mauritanian Institute for Oceanographic Research (IMROP) for his collaboration during the cruise and to the Programme Biodiversité, Gaz, Pétrole (BGP) for additional data. Thanks to Michael Sarnthein (University of Kiel) for providing historical sample material. Nicolas Aleman and Raphaël Certain (both CEFREM, Perpignan) are acknowledged for additional bathymetric data. The manuscript benefited immensely from reviews by Franz T. Fürsich (GeoZentrum Nordbayern) and one anonymous reviewer. The DFG Senate Commission on Oceanography is thanked for providing funding for the research cruise to HW. This project was partially funded through the DFG Research Center/Cluster of Excellence MARUM (Sediment Dynamics, SD2) and is part of the PhD thesis of AK.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Leibniz Center for Tropical Marine Ecology (ZMT), Fahrenheitstraße 6, 28359, Bremen, Germany

    André Klicpera, Julien Michel & Hildegard Westphal

  2. Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (MARUM), University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany

    André Klicpera

  3. Department of Sedimentology, VU University Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Julien Michel

  4. Department of Geosciences, University of Bremen, Bremen, Germany

    Hildegard Westphal

Authors
  1. André Klicpera
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  2. Julien Michel
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  3. Hildegard Westphal
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to André Klicpera.

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Klicpera, A., Michel, J. & Westphal, H. Facies patterns of a tropical heterozoan carbonate platform under eutrophic conditions: the Banc d’Arguin, Mauritania. Facies 61, 421 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10347-014-0421-5

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